Providing information, education, and training to build knowledge, develop skills, and change attitudes that will lead to increased independence, productivity, self determination, integration and inclusion (IPSII) for people with developmental disabilities and their families.

Deputies: Mother Left Son Alone For Weeks
By Dave Reynolds,
Inclusion Daily Express
April 5, 2006

PENSACOLA, FLORIDA--A man with
disabilities is recovering at a local hospital after his mother allegedly
locked him alone inside her house and left him for dead.

Escambia County Sheriff's deputies, responding to a call from a worried
neighbor, found 27-year-old Tony Turner inside the mobile home of his mother,
Debbie Faye McGeorge, on March 24.

The doors and windows of the home had been nailed shut from the outside.

While authorities were not sure how long Turner had been abandoned, they
estimated it from two to three weeks, based in part to the pile of mail in the
mailbox dating back to March 8.

Mike Ward, a spokesperson with the Sheriff's Office, told the Associated
Press that Turner was found wearing an adult diaper that had not been changed
for several weeks.

Turner, who cannot talk, and has cerebral palsy and mental retardation,
reportedly appeared malnourished, with open sores on both legs.

McGeorge, 46, was jailed last Thursday and charged with aggravated abuse
of a disabled adult. She has a history of felony drug possession and petty
theft charges. She is scheduled for a felony arraignment on April 21.

Neighbors told the Pensacola News Journal that they had heard Turner
screaming for days inside the home, but that this was not unusual. They had
assumed that his mother was still taking care of him.

The GCDD is funded under the provisions of P.L. 106-402. The federal law also provides funding to the Minnesota Disability Law Center,the state Protection and Advocacy System, and to the Institute on Community Integration, the state University Center for Excellence. The Minnesota network of programs works to increase the IPSII of people with developmental disabilities and families into community life.